


Just Hold Me a Little Tighter

by Katitty



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Attempted Murder, Blood, Book reference, Child Abuse, Flashbacks, Kind of Original characters, PTSD, Post 2-12, Suicide, Trigger Warnings, but recognisable, implied suicide, s02e12
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-29
Updated: 2017-06-29
Packaged: 2018-11-20 21:59:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11343930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katitty/pseuds/Katitty
Summary: He loved me. Until the moment he died he loved me.Bringing 400 year old memories to the forefront of someone's mind, well, there's bound to be consequences.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Malec Trash Squad](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Malec+Trash+Squad).



> Beta'd by DANILICIOUS (the bessssssst™)
> 
> Follower her oooooon Twitter @MalecsAngel

Makeup and colours don't seem to be enough anymore. Maybe because they've become a part of me. 

No longer my armour. After years of not really having anything to hide. Gold eyelids are for fun now, red lips are for flirting, no colour is for protection anymore. 

The heavy weight of a million rings is a comfort now, the soft tut tut tut of necklaces smacking into shirt buttons cause quiet in my loud mind and after Lilith knows how many years...I can't hide behind them anymore. 

Glitter doesn't help, too-black is too-Alec, graphic tees are not happening. Not in this wardrobe. 

My one of kind, hand sewn, dragon embroidered jacket makes my stomach churn. Because she's right in front of me, laying on the floor, staring at me in the reflection of my mirror. 

A jagged dagger sticks out through her fingers that are clenched at her stomach, and she has blood on her chin that bubbled out of her mouth on the second stab. 

Three times.

I watched my Mama stab herself three times before she looked away from me. I watched my Mama hurt herself again and again and again and then I watched her bleed out on the dirty barn floor because she thought she loved me.

I turn away from the mirror. She was a foul woman.

I need a change.

\---

"You look beautiful," he mutters when we pull apart, his eyes are closed but I still smile. "I was going to tell you before but...yeah." He shrugs. 

We don't linger on the balcony, it's cold and I'm drunk and he's excited and tired. So he takes me to the bedroom, and sits me on the bed. He tells me all about his day. 

He pulls all my rings off while he talks about the tracking chips. "What kind of monster thinks that's okay? If someone came here and tried to chip you they’d have an arrow in their throat before they got up the first flight of stairs."

I smile. He's so tough and manly even when he's gently removing jewellery from his boyfriend's hands. My necklaces are next.

He tells me about becoming the Head of the Institute while he's pulling my boots off and I fall back against the comforter with a happy sigh. "Yay."

He gathers up the collection of rings and necklaces but leaves my boots and makes his way towards my walk in. "NO!" I scream, suddenly this room is too small and the closet is too big and he's not allowed in there. "You can't go in there." 

He looks at me, confused and startled and maybe just a little bit too calm, and takes another step towards the closet. "I'm just going to put your stuff away."

Obviously. 

If this were any other night I would spend an hour carefully removing my armour and placing everything in its rightful place before even considering sleep. But tonight is different. So different from when he last did this for me. 

It's different because he knows where he's going this time. It's different because he's memorised where every piece of jewellery hangs and sits and hides. It's different. 

It's different because he can't go in there and see what I did, the evil I've committed.

He shakes his head at me, a little exasperated and starts walking again. 

It takes my mind a moment to catch up buts he's already in the closet before I can him to stop. 

He's standing at my dresser, putting everything back with pristine precision and paying no mind to the body of my Mama laying right there at his feet.

"You're not allowed in here." 

He looks at me and I guess there's something about the way I glare at her that makes him understand. "Okay," he says it so softly, confused, but understanding. "Okay." 

He walks towards me, reaches out to touch my faces but turns to try and find where my eyes are looking. "What is it?" 

I shake my head. She's dead and he can't see her. "Magnus?" 

My body moves, a slow drag of feet towards the bed. Hers moves too. 

I startle, swing my body back to stare at her and knock into Alec hard enough to send him flying to the floor. "Oof." 

He lands right next to her, and stare up at me with an odd look. "What's wrong." I try to listen. Try to hear the lecture he's surely giving me, but he's fallen right next to her. Right into the puddle of her blood that's permanently stained my floor and he's mad at me. She moves again, twisting and writhing her body until she's crouched down and staring at my Alexander with malice and murder. 

I stare at her with fear and horror rushing through my veins.

She has her dagger and she's handing it to him. Asking him to do what she did. I hear her voice, the last words she said to me still clear as day in mind as she whispers them to him. "Who could love a monster?" 

But that's not her voice. That's mine. And suddenly Alec is angry. He's standing before me before I can blink and his blood covered hands are on my face, forcing me to look at him. "What. Is. Wrong?" 

I shake. "I'm cold." 

He closes his eyes in defeat. His breath flutters angrily for a moment. "I'll run you a bath." He says it so firmly that I'm not sure I have a choice.

I nod.

\---

She's not in the bathroom, so I melt into the water all dead limbs and sore muscles. 

Alec kneels next to the bath, his hands are gentle while he removes my make up. I close my eyes and float for a moment, or two. Or too long I suppose, because suddenly I'm drowning. 

My head is being shoved beneath the water, the hands around my neck are soft and familiar but Alec wouldn't do this. Surely he wouldn't do this. 

I push myself out of the water, my hands come up to throw angry balls of magic, ready to fight whatever demon must be possessing my boyfriend. 

But Alec's not in the bathroom anymore. There's a loud crash from the other end of the loft followed by the sound Alec makes when he's in pain. 

I look back at the person before me. 

He smiles, gently, like he did the first time. "I love you," he's a broken man, "I do love you." 

His hands tighten around my throat and he pushes me back towards the water. "That's why I have to do this." 

I struggle. My hands flail and I inhale water when I try and call for help. I push myself back up, felling small and tiny as I listen to him repeat his last words. Clear as the day I heard them. 

"You don't understand! I have to do this, because I love you! Because I can't stand to see my boy become a monster!" And again, it's not his voice. The words are coming out of my mouth.

He shoves me down again and I don't struggle this time, but magic crackles in the air, pulses through my skin and whips out at his face and neck. 

He screams and I scream and Alec pulls me from the bath roughly, completely ignoring the burning man behind him. 

He holds me while I sob, while I cry for him because he loved me. 

He loved me. Until the moment he died he loved me. 

"Papa, Papa, Papa." Its repeated a hundred times and Alec just holds me. 

I hear her screaming in the walk in wardrobe but I don't cry for her. 

She hit me and she starved me and poured boiling water over my hands until they stopped flaming blue. She took herself from the world and she blamed me and then left me with a broken man.

And I cry for him. For the first time in four hundred years I cry for the broken man who loved me enough to kill me. 

Alec wouldn't kill me. 

He burns and burns and burns and I cry and cry and cry and Alec holds me. 

My Papa's ashes are spread throughout the bathroom but Alec just holds tighter. 

\---


	2. Question and Answer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is NOT another chapter. This is an answer to a question about the fic. I will add to this if I get any more questions.

**Bluerose160: ALEC KILLED MAGNUS?!**

 

No, but if anyone was going to be killed in this fic is going to be Alec (accidentally).

Magnus has been burying the memories of his parents deaths for years. 400 years. And now they're at the forefront of his mind, brought back to him through torture and he's suffering. He's in a lot of pain and at some point that pain has to snap.

There needs to be a release on his mind and that's what this is fic is. Magnus Bane losing his mind.

He's handling it in the beginning. He sees his dead mother lying in the floor and he acknowledges that he's not acknowledging her, and he's okay with her being there so long as she's his little secret.

But then Alec goes into the wardrobe, where his mother's (imaginary) dead body is lying, and suddenly every emotion he's trying to ignore are right there. Thrown into his face and he can't hide from them.

Obviously he doesn't want Alec to know how his parents died so he's scared and angry, which kind of leads to Magnus's mind snapping and he ends up knocking Alec over. He lands in Magnus's mothers (imaginary) blood and Magnus, at this point, is in shock.

Alec draws him a bath, removes Magnus's makeup like the good boyfriend he is, and sits with him for a while.

Now, spoiler alert here: (in the books) Magnus's human father tried to drown him, which lead to his magic coming to life (most warlocks magic is dormant for the first few years of their lives) in an act of protection. His magic killed his father - burned him alive - and Magnus never forgave himself.

Alec doesn't know this - Alec doesn't even know Magnus is having a mental breakdown - so of course he doesn't know that the bath was a bad idea.

After a while of Magnus relaxing in the water, Alec gets up to make him some tea (which isn't in the fic because Magnus doesn't notice him leave) and Magnus drifts to sleep. And then Magnus's memories of his father's death come back the same way his mothers did.

Falling asleep in the bath is a bad idea. He sunk a little and his head slipped under the water and the memory snuck into his mind. Magnus, for a moment, thought it was Alec holding him under water because he recognised the fingers, but when he pulls his head above the water he sees his father.

Now, like his mother in the closet, his father isn't real. He's a figure of Magnus's imagination. He's not technically real but Magnus can't tell. His mind is in a fragile state.

His ‘father’ proceeds to act out the memory, and Magnus feels likes it's happening all over again.

Alec - still in the kitchen - is startled by the splash of water, the thump of Magnus's hands hitting the tub in an attempt to fight back and he drops the cup of tea on his foot.

Now, Alec knows something is wrong but he's stuck with a broken mug and tea all over the floor so he has to get around that to get to Magnus. He's also a shadowhunter so jumping really isn't that hard.

By the time he reaches Magnus, the warlock is already so deep in the memory that his magic is lashing out too. He pulls Magnus out of the tub and holds him against his chest in the hopes that it'll calm him and his magic.

And poor Magnus is still stuck in his mind, but at this point he aware that Alec is there. He can feel the difference between his mind and reality again but that doesn't take away the fact this he's still seeing his father burn alive all over again.

He breaks down emotionally, with Alec trying to coax him back into a sense of calm, and for the first time in 400 years he grieves his father and admits that his mother was the one who ended her life. Not him.

She hated his magic, and in turn hated him. He had to deal with that for a long time. That pain of knowing his mother stopped loving him because of something he couldn't control. She killed herself in spite of her son, made him watch while she ended her life knowing good and well nobody would take him.

His father was different.

He tried to kill his son because he thought his son was going to become a monster. To him, the devil was inside his child and the only way to save him was to kill him. Magnus mourns him, remembers that his father loved him enough to try and save him from hell.

And Alec holds him tighter.

**Author's Note:**

> I understand that this might not have made much sense and I'm more than willing to answer any questions about it in the comments. 
> 
> I don't usually post fics that I'm not sure of (and I'm not very sure of this one) but I really enjoyed writing this and I really wanted to share it. 
> 
> If there are any other tags you think I should add, please tell me and I'll add them as soon as possible. (I DO NOT BLOCK ANONYMOUS COMMENTS SO EVEN IF YOU'RE A GUEST YOU CAN ASK)


End file.
